1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a model railway traffic light apparatus and a control method thereof.
2. Description of Related Art
So far a model railway of the so-called N gauge or HO gauge standard has been on the market, and a rail-integrated model railway traffic light apparatus, which is applicable to the model railway, is disclosed in JP-JITSUKO-HEI-03-19920. The traffic light apparatus detects a passing of each wheel of a toy train by a sensor attached to a predetermined position of a rail, and accordingly switches a turning-on pattern of a signal light. For example, at the timing when the front of a toy train passes through, i.e. the timing when the first wheel is detected, the signal light is switched from yellow to red. Then when each pre-set time passes, the signal light is switched in such an order: from red to yellow, and then from yellow to green. Such change of the turning-on pattern is not dependent on the speed of the train which passes through the traffic light apparatus, the length of the train, in other words, not dependent on such traveling conditions as the size of the layout. While such change differs from that of the real railway in that it is carried out only at a time base, but the reality close to the real railway is required.
However, the timing for switching the light turning-on pattern (i.e. the display time of each light turning-on pattern) in the conventional model railway traffic light apparatus is set to a fixed value, causing the presence of the disruption of the reality of the signal light turning-on operation. A typical example can be named in which a relatively long train circles a relatively small endless railway. In this case, the circling period from that when the end of the train, which is in a first circling movement, passes through the traffic light apparatus until that when the front of the train, which is in a circling movement that is just after the first circling movement, passes through the traffic light apparatus becomes extremely short. Therefore, in the case where the front of the train passes through the traffic light apparatus before the signal light is switched back to green, causing such troublesome case to occur where the signal light is only turned on to red and yellow, and in the case where the train circles at a higher speed, the signal light is only turned on to red. Such inconvenience can be solved by accelerating the switching timing of the light turning-on pattern. However, in this case a reality disruption will occur for a large endless railway in that the switching of the light turning-on patterns becomes tight compared to the circling of the train.